


Bloody Springs of Uchiha

by Orlha



Series: Sakura blossoms in April's showers [3]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Bad Decisions, Gen, Hallucinations, Mental Health Issues, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:00:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26011522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orlha/pseuds/Orlha
Summary: Why Sasuke left Konoha and what happened after that.Sasuke's POV in ESR through to SFoA.
Relationships: Uchiha Sasuke & Trauma
Series: Sakura blossoms in April's showers [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1260014
Comments: 14
Kudos: 122





	Bloody Springs of Uchiha

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [this is my body and soul here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25567186) by [Mook_aron](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mook_aron/pseuds/Mook_aron). 



> **Notes:** I don’t usually do this. But when people can’t be reasoned…
> 
> Basically, For [SasskatShinobi1](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SasskatShinobi1/pseuds/SasskatShinobi1) whose reading comprehension is so bad that they apparently believe writing about Sasuke’s trauma and Sasuke seeing ghosts is copying this other writer’s work (who seems to believe the same thing, much wow) whose name isn't Kishitmoto and that calling a fic a plotty one-shot is apparently belittling it (I must have been belittling myself all these time then).
> 
> Oh yea, I’m definitely calling you out. _Boohoo princess,_ I’m sorry your feelings are hurt.
> 
> Also it's not mook's fic, mook's the one that's being harassed by these readers. It's the fic in her comments if you're wondering. 
> 
> **Warnings:** This fic deals with alot of hallucinations and flashbacks.

Sasuke wakes with a start; arms flailing, legs caught in his sheet blanket. His lungs shudder with his breath, a roaring sound filling his ears, swallowing him and leaving him deaf.

All these years and yet the thought of red still frightens him. He clutches at his chest, staring up into the pitch-black darkness that surrounds him. The pitch-black darkness is a relief.

His thoughts flounder at the thought of red.

The sight of blood pooling around his parents, the blood crusting beneath his nails, staining his fingers. The sight of Yashiro-jisan’s blank sharingan eyes staring back at him, of nii-san’s red, _red, red, red—_

> _“Nii-san!”_
> 
> _Sasuke runs, begging his legs to move faster. The sword swings. Red splatters over him._
> 
> _“Why?”_

He shakes, fingers clawing into the bedsheets. Blood fills his mouth as he tries to stop his jaws from shaking.

He’s not worthless. He’s not—

The cotton beneath his finger shreds. Steely fingers wrapped around his throat, gripping him tightly. Burning panic clawed at him.

He’s not worthless.

_Not anymore._

He’s twelve now.

Genin.

_Shinobi._

Soon, he’ll have to face his brother— Itachi— _that man._ He _has_ to. That’s the only way to bring honour back into his family.

> _“You’re an Uchiha. You must carry our pride and honour when you walk out the doors,” mother says. She pushes his back straight up. “Now, no slouching. If I catch you slouching, you don’t get any mochi tonight.”_

His shoulders stutter and he presses a palm to his hot eyes. Sasuke doesn’t care if the only Uchiha is him. He’ll die with honour or die trying. His mother deserved better. Shisui deserved better.

>   
>  _Itachi turns. The red in his eyes gleamed ominously in dim light._
> 
> _“Nii-san!” His legs folds under him, hands trembling violently. “Why? WHY?”_
> 
> _“Foolish little brother, cling to your wretched life.”_

The breath catches in his throat, the memories knocking him empty for a moment. Then the sear of anger and hate rushes through him, just as the promise of power ripples on his neck and down his spine.

Sasuke forces himself to breathe slowly, just like his mandated therapist had told him to. He pushes himself up and sees the silhouette of Itachi.

> _"You are not worth killing.”_

“Get out!” he yells to the silhouette. “You’re not real!”

A kunai lands bullseye where the silhouette had been, burying deep into the wardrobe’s door. He grips his knees, digging through the thin flat sheet and into his skin. “I hate you,” he says. “ _I hate you,”_ he murmurs into his knees.

✥.✥.✥

Sasuke hates his teammates. The blond is a burden and so is the pink-haired. Arms thin like twigs, without any form or power, inefficient clothing, no benefits aside from Konoha requiring him a team to be promoted.

Useless.

_Just like him._

Deadlast and he dig through the endless rubble, searching for explosives, enemy weapons. Pink-haired never appears. Kakashi tells Naruto to don’t mind Pink hair’s disappearance. Somehow, she had gotten away without showing up.

That a useless teammate gets preferential treatment burns.

If Konoha doesn’t care about him, then he doesn’t care for Konoha either.

He goes back to the Uchiha compound, the districts emptying out as Sasuke approaches the old clan buildings. The tall towering doors creak loudly at his touch. His hand slides across the dark blood-stained wood.

Saya and Baru had been here that night. Their blood sprayed across the wood so thick and viscous that even after countless of hours scrubbing had not removed it.

Sasuke averts his eyes, compelling himself to continue further in. Blood seeps into his sandals and between his toes with each step he takes.

He is not worthless.

His legs are jittery, hands deep inside his pocket to stop them from shaking, shoulders slouching, refusing to look up at the dead bodies. He walks past the corpses of the two bakers, past Yashiro-jisan’s corpse.

 _‘Avenge us,’_ Yashiro-jisan whispers, grabbing his ankle.

I will, Sasuke promises and Yashiro-jisan releases him.

‘ _You promised.’_

He’s two houses from his home when Mirai and Kiou, twins, pop up from the bushes.

 _‘Sasuke-nii! Are you playing with us?’_ They reach out to grab him with their bloody fingers. He used to play with them just before he had entered the academy.

Sasuke closes his eyes, prodding further onto the road. They’re not real, he tells himself. They had only just celebrated their third birthday then.

 _‘Kagome kagome. When, oh when will it come out. In the night of dawn, the crane and turtle slipped. Who is behind you now?’ _the two twins sing as they follow him down the road, their eyes empty of eyeballs, blood streaking down their white necks.

 _‘A kunai and a sharingan,’_ Mirai, the younger of the twins, sings and dances around him. She tilts her head and it rolls off her neck and onto the ground.

_‘A raven and a crow.’_

A raven caws from a distant tree, breaking the deep silence that Sasuke hadn’t realised had been there. The wind blows, a wooden window rattles, an eyeball rolls across the stained flagstone walkway, leaking its vitreous humor across the uneven stone.

“They’re not real,” he whispers even as he leaves bloody footprints behind him. They follow him until he reaches home, standing at the gate, holding their heads under their arms, staring at him.

Sasuke steps up the walkway and stops, staring up at the house.

The garden is overrun with weeds and mother’s once favourite azaleas. He can see the bloody handprint of his seven-year-old self on the door, the footprints across the genkan.

>   
>  _“Nii-san!”_

The helplessness of the moment then tears into him. If he had been better then. If he had been—

_Not worthless. Always following him, always copying him. Worthless without him._

>   
>  _“You promised to help me with training!” he pouts._
> 
> _Itachi smiles slightly, beckoning him and Sasuke brightens, thinking they’re going. “I’m sorry Otouto,” Itachi says as he pokes his forehead. “Not today.”_

Sasuke clenches his fist, ignoring the crescents digging blood into his palm.

> _“Why?”_

He can’t— Can’t do this now. He’s an adult, a genin, a _shinobi._

And he can’t even step into his house.

_He’s better than this._

Sasuke flees, stalking to the training ground instead. He starts with the burning leaf kata, letting his muscles flow from movement to movement. Then the morning sun kata, then the evening sun and by the time he gets to the Uchiha clan katas, his movements stagger.

It’s because his muscles are tired and not because he isn’t sure of the right movements, he tells himself.

>   
>  _“Arms straight,” Itachi says, correcting his arms._
> 
> _“Yea, yea! You gotta move like you mean it.” Shisui grins._

It’s hard to learn from a scroll, this, Sasuke refuses to think about. Learning this is his birthright. As much as he hates the memories of it, he’s an Uchiha, he needs to know this.

He turns and sees his father standing at the corner of the training ground with the look of disapproval on his face. Sasuke grits his teeth. Even in death, he’s not free from his father’s disapproval.

 _‘Avenge us. The Uchiha clan must be avenged.’_ his father whispers.

Sasuke forces himself to practice harder. Until his muscles ache and beyond that.

It’s dusk when he wakes, face pressed against the dirt. Forcing himself to an upright position, Sasuke stares out into the forest, across the deserted Uchiha compound. There are no lights in the compound anymore.

Dark and silent, just like he remembered that night—

>   
>  _He runs down the compound, his sandals squishing from the pools of blood strewn across the gravel road._
> 
> _“Someone! Help!”_

Sasuke presses his nails into his palm, trying to will the memories, the _ghosts_ of his nightmare and forces himself to focus on something else. The branches creak and rustle in the wind, slapping itself in a macabre orchestra of bones cracking.

_Just like how the bones cracked in the funeral pyres._

In the darkness, he can barely see the outline of trees on the edge of the training ground, even with the waning moon above. Just like that night—

>   
>  _"You are not worth killing.”_

“I’m _better_ than you,” he yells. “I’m better. _Better.”_ The world sharpens in his vision, the burn of chakra at the base of his neck beckons him. Sasuke hisses, hand clawing at the seal.

He’ll leave, Sasuke decides then.

There is nothing left in Konoha for him. Two teammates that are nothing but a burden, one that didn’t even bother turning up for team missions, a sensei that didn’t care.

Itachi stands at the corner of the training ground, staring at him. His blood splattered anbu mask is in his left hand, his unsheathed tanto in the other hand is slowly dripping bright red blood onto the dark soil.

“I’m worth more than you’ll ever be,” Sasuke screams at Itachi.

✥.✥.✥

Sasuke wakes. He heaves, trying to squeeze air into his lungs, but no matter how hard he tries, Sasuke can’t match a single breath.

>   
>  _The sword swings. Red, hot liquid splatters across his face._

“It’s a dream, just a sage-damned dream,” he repeats to himself, forcing himself to stop clawing at his eyes, forcing his lungs to take slow, long breaths.

The twins giggle at the corner of the room tossing eyeballs between each other like they are otedama bean bags.

 _‘One by one, one after the fool. One, two, two, two,’_ they sing the otedama song.

He ignores them, forcing himself to get off the bed and head down to the labs. Sasuke had promised to let Kabuto run some tests today, regardless of what his near-future plans included; it wouldn’t do to alert Orochimaru to him yet.

The lab is empty. Sasuke clicks his tongue, annoyed that more of his training time would be now reduced. He waits and waits. Outside, he can hear the quiet shuffling of sandals walking past.

His father stares at him from the corner of the room.

 _‘Avenge us,’_ he reminds Sasuke.

I will, he promises. Soon.

Soon, before Orochimaru tries to take his body, Sasuke promises to himself as he fiddles with his weapons.

_‘In the night of dawn, the crane and turtle slipped. Who is behind you now?’_

Mirai peers from across the table, blood still oozing from her eye sockets.

_‘A kunai and a sharingan.’_

_‘A raven and—’_

“Sorry, I’m late. I had an exciting morning!” Kabuto chirps, sweeping into the lab, sweeping his two assistants along. “Extremely exciting!”

Sasuke scoffs.

“Oh, I’m sure the news about us capturing Hatake’s little heir hasn’t arrived here,” Kabuto continues as though Sasuke hadn’t snorted derisively at his words.

“Ah, our cute little Sakura-chan.” Kabuto rolls the leather case of needles and pulls out a stack of paper. “What a pleasant surprise to find out that she has a kekkai genkai that allows her to copy bloodlines. Her father had never told me about it. She’s too young to bear children safely, so I extracted her eggs—”

“I don’t care,” Sasuke curtly. So, the deadweight had finally some little value. “She was always useless. Anything additional would be surprising,” he sneers.

“Ah, that’s quite true. I worked with her father for a long time. It was _so_ easy to manipulate him.” Kabuto carefully inserts his needle under Sasuke’s skin and Sasuke looks away.

“I would convince her father used to practice his torture experiments on her and test its effectiveness. And by _his_ torture experiments, I really mean _mine._ He used to tell me all about it. Saved me so much time from testing them out,” Kabuto says, marking the syringe out.

Sasuke thinks about how she had wished she hadn’t had parents. He wonders if it had been a cry for help.

What kind of shinobi would need someone to save them?

>   
>  _He runs down the compound, his sandals squishing from the pools of blood strewn across the gravel road._
> 
> _“Someone! Help!”_

The thought of his teammate— the pink-haired— the burden being something more than useless disturbs him.

✥.✥.✥

Sasuke follows after she flees, making sure that both Orochimaru and her eggs are destroyed. It’s too late for him to take back his words, but _this,_ he can do.

**Author's Note:**

> Didn't want to add this to "Distant cry from spring" because I was going to gift this petty fic to the ridiculous reader, if there's no "gifted" to on this fic, then they must have either blown a blood vessel and rejected it, or been so embarrassed that they rejected it.
> 
> I don't get mad very easily, but any writer who thinks that they "own" the rights to a vague idea or somewhat popular combination _(whether it's Anbu Sakura trained by Kakashi or Sasuke's trauma and seeing stuff)_ and then proceed to accuse another writer _(or manipulating their readers to do it for them)_ for copying just because  
> (A) they posted it a min/an hour/a day/a week earlier or  
> (B) because apparently they are the only ones who can come up with that combination it's shocking that someone else could have come up completely independently or  
> (C) Both together  
> gets a huge thumbs down.  
> Either way, I wouldn't have written this petty fic if it hadn't been for them, so feel free to thank them! I might be accused by them for copying though, since it has Sasuke's trauma and Sasuke seeing ghosts and the colour red. ☺
> 
> P.S: Dear Author-san and reader-san, I hold grudges forever, I never forget and I never forgive when I'm this pissed. Good Bye.


End file.
